Lib at Large: And now there are two -- the last Marin Pearl Harbor survivors remember infamous day

DEC. 7, 1941 — a day that will live in infamy, and in the fading memories of the last two Marin survivors of the attack on Pearl Harbor, 72 years ago on Saturday.

It wasn't that long ago that 17 survivors and their wives got together for lunch every other month at a Marin restaurant. But those gatherings of friendship and shared experience are no more. They were over even before John Rauschkolb, the survivor who organized them, died in October at age 92.

On this Dec. 7, Fran Jenkins, a retired Marin Realtor, and Novato's George Larsen, a former KRON-TV cameraman, are the only two survivors left. Both are 95.

"We're like the last of the Mohicans," Jenkins joked one morning this week, sitting in the living room of the neat-as-a-pin Terra Linda home he shares with his wife of 68 years, Julie, a former Navy nurse.

"We got married in uniform," he recalled with a twinkle. "She outranked me."

A onetime Marin Realtor of the Year, Jenkins still has a handshake like a vise grip and the engaging personality of a businessman who sold real estate for 45 years. He says he treats Dec. 7 as no big deal when it comes around every year, but he plans to be among the handful of Bay Area survivors at Saturday's Pearl Harbor Day on Coast Guard Island in San Francisco.

"I thank God I lasted so long," he said. "It's kind of a shared honor. I feel pretty lucky."

Over the years, he's downplayed his survivor status, saying he doesn't like to dwell on it, insisting he did nothing heroic on that day.

"It was a date in history, I was there and so what?" he said with a shrug.

But when he and his fellow survivor are gone, there will be no one left in Marin who actually witnessed the events of that Sunday morning all those years ago, when 353 Japanese fighters, bombers and torpedo planes attacked the U.S. Pacific Fleet in two deadly waves, killing 2,402 Americans, wounding 1,282 others and drawing the country into World War II.

Jenkins was a young Navy petty officer on the USS Bagley, a destroyer docked across from Battleship Row, right in the flight path, it turned out, of the enemy Zeroes as they came in with their deadly cargo. They were close enough for him to make out the gritted teeth of the pilots as they dropped their torpedoes, which he still refers to as "fish." Of the eight Navy battleships across from him, four sank and four others were heavily damaged. The Japanese also sank or damaged three cruisers, three destroyers, an anti-aircraft training ship, a minelayer and 188 airplanes.

"I had a seat on the 50-yard line," Jenkins recalled. "We were surprised and mortified because they caught us with our pants down. It was a bad day, but it passed. Better days followed."

Over the years, he and his wife have revisited Pearl Harbor twice for commemorations and ceremonies.

"The first time we went it did affect him," she said. "They have a monument there with the names of the dead, and two of his buddies are on it. It brought back what happened that day."

A subsequent visit wasn't as emotional, but Jenkins has no desire to ever go back again.

"I don't have pleasant memories of Pearl," he said with downcast eyes. "It's not one of my favorite spots. Whenever I went back, I went back reluctantly."

Vivid memories

Still tall and erect in his 90s, George Larsen, a former president of a San Francisco Chapter of the Pearl Harbor Survivors Association, is proud to wear his survivors cap when he goes out in public. He beams when he tells the story of the time he wore it to the grocery store and a woman he didn't know took notice, sauntered over to him and planted a kiss of gratitude on his cheek.

"She gave me a big smooch," he said, laughing heartily.

Larsen was a young radio operator at a Coast Guard station in the Diamond Head Lighthouse just east of Pearl Harbor on the morning of the attack. He recalls being awakened by what he thought was an earthquake but turned out to be Japanese planes shaking his building as they flew overhead on their way to their targets.

From a window, he could see the bombs and torpedoes being dropped in the harbor, shooting plumes of water he described as "geysers" 75 feet in the air. It was an out-of-body experience for him, almost as if it were happening to someone else.

"I watched the whole thing, but it didn't register as life-threatening for me, for some unknown reason," he said, sitting in his favorite chair in the living room of his waterfront home in Bel Marin Keys. "I didn't feel part of it."

It was a sneak attack, but Larsen says he wasn't that surprised by it. He knew something was coming, but he didn't know when.

"I knew we were going to be in a war with Japan," he said as sunlight glinted on the water of the lagoon through the picture window behind him. "A friend of mine and I had a lot of time on our hands and studied the Japanese Navy. We found out that their navy was a hell of a lot bigger than ours. I said, 'We're gonna be in trouble.'"

After the war, Larsen went to college on the GI Bill and became an Emmy-winning cameraman. There is a framed photo on the wall near his front door of him behind a big, bulky televisions camera, shooting from a San Francisco rooftop. At age 92, the Coast Guard promoted him to honorary chief petty officer for his years of public speaking at Coast Guard units and events, sharing his stories about the attack and the war.

As an active member and officer with the local survivors association, he has enjoyed the camaraderie of his fellow survivors, but that, too, has become a thing of the past. Originally, there were an estimated 84,000 survivors nationwide. There are only about 2,500 to 3,000 still alive, according to the national survivors association. After 53 years as an active organization, it dissolved last year due to the advancing age and declining health of the dwindling number of members it had left.

"My best friend in the service called me last spring and passed away not long after that," Larsen said with a bittersweet smile. "I don't have any friends left from Dec. 7. I think I've outlived them all."